Hitai-ate
by ace45ray
Summary: Just after Naruto leaves to train with Jiraiya, two new ninja appear in Konoha. Who are these ninja, and what effect will they have on the remaining members of the Konoha 11? Rated T for violence/ language. OC's
1. Prologue

**PROLOGUE**

* * *

The old man walked through the forest, his back bent with the weight of age. He smiled as he looked at the familiar trees surrounding him, their leaves rustling in the wind. He had been here before, and was glad to have finally returned. It had been long since he left the Land of Fire, and it pleased him to return to the country he grew up in.

"Gran'pa! Wait up, you're too fast!"

The young girl's shout drew him out of his memories, and he smiled as he turned to look at the children who called him their grandfather.

He had to admit that they had been pleasantly surprising to find during his travels, and he was pleased that they had come with him.

First there was Sumire, the purple- haired girl who, while quite the joker, was quick to attack the bullies who picked on her brother. Then there was Akairo, a quiet redhead who was as happy to sit and watch the clouds as play with other children. Their starkly different personalities managed to compliment each other, and the old man had been overjoyed when they started following him around town and calling him "grandpa."

"Onesan, you don't need to yell, it's too loud..." the boy began.

"Oh, quiet, you can't complain, you're the one gran'pa always carries!" the girl countered.

"Ha ha ha, tell you what, Sumire, how about I carry both of you?" the old man said with a smile. The little girl grinned from ear to ear as she nodded. He grunted as he picked her up and carried her in his left arm, with Akairo in his right.

They continued on happily for awhile, listening to the sounds of the forest around them, when Akairo quietly voiced a question.

"Hey gran'pa, when can we train to be ninjas?"

The question hardly surprised the old man, as he knew this was one of the reasons the children had wanted to travel with him, but still...

"You can start in a few years if you still wish, Akairo. The life of a ninja is not one for children so young as you two."

Sumire pouted as she said, "But I'm already five, gran'pa, and Akairo's four!"

"Four and five sixths," the redhead spoke up.

"Fine, four and five sixths, but we're still old enough for you to teach us something, gran'pa!"

"Ha ha ha, alright then Sumire, your argument is quite convincing. I'll tell you what, tomorrow I'll teach you the basic clone technique, and if you do well, I'll teach you something else the next day. How does that sound to you?"

"Yay!" the children shouted happily, knowing that if they did really good, he might treat them to some special food, too.

Sumire jumped off of his arm and tied a purple cloth around her forerhead.

"I'm Sumire Hayashi the ninja, and this is my hitai-ate!" she said, thumbing the cloth.

* * *

A/N

Wait, that's not all! The chapters after this will all be much longer than this, so please, keep reading.


	2. The New Shinobi!

**EIGHT YEARS LATER**

Konoha was in a state of panic. Three weeks ago, Sasuke Uchiha abandoned Konoha to join Orochimaru and the recently formed Otogakure, which came closely behind the death of the beloved Third Hokage. Shortly after, Naruto Uzumaki, the jinchuriki of the nine-tailed fox, left the village to travel and train under Jiraiya, one of the Sannin. The two of them leaving left one of the new teams missing half their members, members whom were desperately needed in order for the team to take missions vital to the recovery of the village.

Which was why Tsunade Senju, recently appointed Fifth Hokage, was quite surprised when two youths appeared at the front gate of the village asking to be allowed to join Konoha's shinobi forces.

They had arrived wearing Konoha hitai-ate, but had never been an official part of any shinobi force. Tsunade had decided to give them temporary residence in Konoha, as well as an audience to understand their reasons for wanting to join, as well as an evaluation of their skills. They had been given psychological exams and had a general information file summarizing their appearances and personalities created. Now, as they stood before her, Tsunade realized that the names of the purple and red haired girl and boy certainly fit.

Sumire (Violet) and Akairo (Red) Hayashi (Forest) each had hair the color of their names, and were wearing green and black. However, that was where the similarities ended; while Sumire had deep purple eyes that seemed to shine from the sheer bubbley-ness of her personality, Akairo had light green eyes that lazily took in every detail around him. She had on a light green tank top and knee-length brown pants, while he wore a green tee shirt with a red stripe down the left and loose, flowing black pants. Sumire grinned cheerfully at whatever life threw at her, while Akairo seemed quietly content to be where he was. Sumire was also a bit taller than her brother.

Looking over their files, Tsunade saw that they were of sound mind, and had about as much skill as any of the genin who had participated in the recent Chuunin Exams, surprising considering that they had never had any official training. "Where did you two receive your training? It doesn't say in your files."

At this, Akairo spoke up. "We learned from our adopted grandfather, he was a Konoha ninja during the Second Shinobi War. He taught us the basics and encouraged us to find our own specialties and develop our abilities."

Tsunade nodded. "That answers my question of why you want to join Konoha as well, I suppose."

Akairo nodded.

"Speaking of your specialties, what are they?"

"I'm a kenjutsu specialist," Sumire said, "and I also have some skill with genjutsu. Akairo uses mainly wind and fire type ninjutsu along with basic taijutsu."

Tsunade's eyebrow shot up at this; using wind and fire ninjutsu in conjunction is rare in the shinobi world. "Wind _and_ fire? That's a rare combination..."

Akairo nodded. "It took some training, but I managed to be able to use wind and fire at the same time, although my main affinity is wind."

Tsunade nodded, deep in thought. A wind affinity is more common in Sunagakure, and is very rare in Konoha – in fact, the only ninja in Konoha at the moment whose affinity is wind is Asuma Sarutobi. But being able to use wind and fire simultaneously in combat would be an even more useful ability.

"Alright, I think we can easilly allow you two to join Konoha, with some provisions, of course." At this, Sumire pumped her fist in the air and Akairo smiled softly. "Hold it – I said with provisions. You don't even know what they are yet." Akairo nodded and said, "Yes, but I'm sure whatever you decide will be fair and reasonable, Tsunade-sama."

Tsunade blinked and smirked at the boy. "You sure know how to butter people up, don't you kid?"

Akairo smiled and motioned for her to continue.

"Right. So, first, you two are going to be on a mild probation. We'll be watching you, and if you do anything suspicious or illegal, an Anbu is going to be on your backs about it pretty quickly. Second, you will be given the rank of genin and placed on a four-man team until further notice, although you will be allowed to take the next chuunin exams. Finally, you'll undergo an actual test of your combat abilities, which I'll leave up to the jonin in charge of your team. Any questions?"

Sumire nodded. "We're going to be put in a four-man team? What team, who will our teammates be?"

"One of our teams is currently short two members, so you'll be put on that team. In addition, the jonin in charge of said team is ex-Anbu, so he'll be able to handle your parole. As far as who your teammates are..." Tsunade scribbled something on a sheet of paper before standing up and handing it to the Anbu who appeared next to her desk. "Thank you, Hawk. I'm sending for your teammates, and they should get here in about an hour. In the meantime, you can feel free to explore the town, but remember – you two are on parole, so no acting up."

Akairo and Sumire nodded, and Akairo spoke up. "Where will we be staying? I assume that we will be living in a house or apartment somewhere in the village?"

Tsunade nodded. "That's right. We'll worry about that later, though. For now you should just look around, get used to the villaige."

* * *

Sakura was not a morning person.

So when the Anbu had awoken her to tell her to report to Tsunade-sama's office, she was not happy. She would rather be sleeping in than going out on missions or being lectured by Tsunade-sama, especially after Sasuke and Naruto left.

But the Hokage had summoned her, so she had to wake up. Unfortunately.

"Aargh! What is so important that Tsunade-sama had to wake me up so early on my day off," Sakura fumed as she walked to the Hokage tower.

As she sleepily considered going back to bed, she bumped into a girl with long purple hair cut in wavy layers with a katana slung over her shoulder. "Watch where you're going," Sakura said, before taking another look at the other girl. She smirked. "Nice hairdo," she snarked.

The purple-haired girl scowled at her, before grinning evilly and replying, "You too, pinkie." She laughed at her joke as she walked away, leaving Sakura fuming.

When she got to Tsunade's office, she was greeted by the Anbu who had woken her up. "Oh, good, you're here. The Hokage warned me that I might have to go back and make sure you came instead of sleeping in."

Sakura frowned at the nondescript man. "Thanks for the vote of confidence."

He shrugged. "I'm just a messenger today, don't blame me."

"Whatever. Is Tsunade-sama in her office?"

"Yeah, and Kakashi-san should be here soon too."

"I doubt it," Sakura said, but she was actually a bit surprised that Kakashi had been summoned as well. She entered the office. The first thing she noticed was that her teacher was carefully poring over the contents of a pair of folders, but when Sakura entered, Tsunade was quick to close them so that she couldn't see what was in them. The second thing she noticed was that Kakashi, who was well known for his lateness, was actually _early_, and seemed to be talking with Tsunade about the contents of the folders. Now Sakura was worried. What could be so important that Kakashi would be early?

"Ah, Sakura. I'm glad you're here, I just sent Hawk to get you in case you had decided to sleep in."

"So I heard," she snarked.

Tsunade raised an eyebrow at her student's tone before remembering that she wasn't a morning person. "All right, I'll make this quick. I've found two new shinobi to fill the gaps in your team."

Sakura's eyebrows shot up. "But... What about–"

"Sakura," Kakashi began, "This is only temporary, to fill in the gaps until Naruto returns from his trip with Jiraiya-sama. These shinobi are not replacing Naruto and Sasuke."

This calmed Sakura down. "Alright... Who are they?"

"Akairo and Sumire Hayashi, a brother and sister who asked to join Konoha this morning. I decided to allow them to join us, with the conditions that they join a four-man team and submit to Anbu supervision. Since your team is lacking two members, and Kakashi is ex-Anbu, it works out perfectly for them to join your team."

"Well alright then. When do we get to meet them?"

Tsunade turned to Kakashi and nodded. "I think I'll leave that up to Kakashi-san, since he's the team leader."

"Hmm... I suppose we can meet tomorrow, if that's alright. They need to see the village, right?"

"Right," Tsunade nodded. "I just arranged for an apartment in the barracks that they can use, and I was about to send Hawk out to get them..."

"But you don't know where they are," Kakashi finished. "Okay, I'll let them know if I see them." He turned to Sakura. "We'll meet at training ground three, alright?"

Sakura nodded. "Got it. See you tomorrow, Kakashi-sensei."


	3. An update

So, I have decided that I'm going to round out what I have so that I've got about 5000 words, and then I will combine the chapters I've written so far into one much larger one. After that, every subsequent chapter will be at least that long.

Enjoy, keep reading, review if you want, and if you live somewhere where it snows, please make a snowman.


End file.
